Visit to the Czech Foreign Police

We did our part to keep the world stamp pad industry viable today.  We visited the Czech Foreign Police.


It was a pleasant outing, the sun was burning away the morning fog as Kristine, Silas and I strolled along the river, through downtown, and up seedy Praška Třida.  There are notable landmarks nearby, so the office is easy to find.  The Hotel Gomel stands like a communist sentry across the street and you know that if you go by Erotic City you know you have gone one building too far. 

Outside the building two pretty young women in somewhat conservative attire asked us in Russian if we speak Russian.  Kristine said no, english.  They then asked if we were going to the 2nd or 3rd floor (that would be visas vs. permanent residency) and offered to help us.  Kristine thanked them and in we went.

That may seem innocent enough to you, but I had just read this article the other day regarding other people's experiences at the Czech Foreign Police in Prague - note the comment dated 7.8.08 about the Russian Mafia.  I watched our backs while replaying James Bond scenes in my mind to be ready in case we needed to act fast.

We took a number and sat down to wait.  It was only a short while before we were ushered into the office, Kristine told the woman we'd like to meet with our Ms. F. and we were ushered back out to wait.  Ms. F. came out a minute later and brought us to her desk. 

Kristine told her that we were there to inform them of a change of address.  She handed over our contract as proof.  It was the original (very important), had all of our full names and birthdates (very important), and had the date it was prepared (very important) which happened to be before we came to the country (very bad).  Kristine was nervous that she would give us a hard time about this. 

Ms. F. looked at it and mumbled, "This is gonna be something," as she walked out of the room.  We could feel their eyes on us as she talked with her supervisor at an office door behind us.  At first she told us that the end date on the contract (June 2010) was a problem because we can't have a contract for longer than we have a visa.  Then she just said, whatever, and started filling out the paperwork.

Here is where I really wish I had invested in rubber stamps (which incidentally have an interesting history).  Most every piece of paper got stamped.  Not just one or two, but up to six on a page.  Keep in mind that there was a separate copy of everything for each of us.  As Ms. F. was working up a sweat, Kristine commented (to be empathetic) that it was a lot of work.  She did not seem amused.

In the end Ms. F. got everything stamped, we got our change of address officialized, the Russian Mafia did not knock us off.  A successful morning.

For her afternoon fun, Kristine got to go to the school to make sure it would be okay with the teacher if Lucy doesn't change in front of all the other 5th graders.  You see kids change into their gym clothes in their classroom.  So the kids take off the outer clothes and put on shorts and t-shirts.  Lucy, having been brought up as an American with our Puritan roots, did not feel comfortable with this and had always just worn gym clothes to school on gym day.


Kristine was not looking forward to this at all, but at least Lucy's teacher is a nice, sweet lady.  Unfortunately, the wiry, crabby male gym teacher was in the the classroom.  Kristine asked to speak with him in the hall.  He tried staring her down when they got out there.  Kristine explained the situation.  He said he had already told Lucy it was okay to change in the bathroom.  Lucy contends that he did not tell her that.  Who knows, maybe he did - in Czech.


Time to go buy a bike for Caleb.


Peter

Phone

We are now cell phone owners.

After doing a bunch of reading on the English language website for the company (Telefonica O2) that bought out the national phone company, I went with our friend Jan (by the way, this is a man, pronounced like "yawn") to buy phone and internet service. We took a number and waited.

When our turn came, we talked about internet access. The fellow did not speak English so Jan translated. From my reading, I understood that they had 8 Mb/s WiFi that a person could get for 750 Kč ($42) per month or 650 Kč ($37.68) if they also bought a phone plan. Since it did not state it was DSL or mention requiring a landline (which are not in everyone's house), I believed it was essentially buying access to a great city-wide WiFi network.

When I got there, they told me I was wrong. It is DSL and we have no landline. So, our option with them is to buy their mobile internet access at 750 Kč ($42) per month plus 1890 Kč ($109.57) for the receiver. This would get us a 3 Mb/s connection with a 10GB/month maximum data transfer. Or we can keep connecting to wireless networks where the opportunity presents itself. We're sticking with the latter option for the moment.

Then phone. We were going to buy a plan, but being foreigners without a permanent address (I wonder if they consider our neighbors' addresses permanent), we could only buy a prepaid SIM card. Now you all know all about cell phones, so I won't bore you with the details (as if I haven't already) - all of which were new to me. Suffice it to say that I bought a number, but no phone at that point.

The problem with the phones is that everything (except food, public transportation, entrance to cultural events, medical care, and walking) is much more expensive here than in the U.S. So, I walked away contemplating whether the buy the cheapest phone ($60), or something more expensive and plan to take it back with us, or find somebody's cast off, or buy a U.S. phone and ask somebody to mail it to us. We finally settled on buy the cheapest. We also decided to get a second number and use a friends extra phone so we can touch base when we need to.

So, I went back to the phone store alone. When my number came up I walked up the young woman who said something - in Czech. I used my favorite phrase "Ne mluvim české." (I don't speak Czech). I always want to follow it up with, "but we can do this," except I don't know the words. So, I told her in my limited Czech, "I want phone, " and pointed to the SIM card offer in their brochure. I told her I want !300 Kč! of credit on it. I asked if it is still "two times the crowns" meaning double credit (yesterday was the last day of the offer).

Then, I needed to ask for a phone, but I didn't know how to say cheapest. I should have asked Kristine before leaving. Fortunately, I knew the price, so I said, "I want telephone, Nokia, 995 crowns." The whole room waited in suspense as I struggled to say 995 (deviet stoh devact piet - which I am sure is not quite correct). She brought me the phone. I paid her the money. And everyone went home happy.

The next trick was using the phone with all the instructions in Czech. Suffice it to say, we got our first cell phone call last night.

Banking

The following post is about setting up a bank account. Boring. Unless, of course, you are thinking of setting up a bank account in the Czech Republic. Then the information may prove useful. Whenever we post such dull, but practical information, it will carry the label "practical."

There are two money questions that we faced (once we knew we could actually save enough to pay the bills): 1) How to pay the rent, 2) How to get money from the American bank to us in CR.

A few months ago we started studying how money is transferred between people here. We had always used cash and knew that credit cards are very commonly used, but would a phone company or the landlord take a wad of bills each month? It turns out that instead of checks, people fill out a form at the bank (or online) authorizing the bank to transfer funds from their account to the payee. It seemed we would need to get money into a bank.

There are four common ways to get money from bank in US to bank in CR:

1. Cash - take it out as cash and carry it along.
Why? No withdrawal or money transfer fees.
Why not? Too risky (imagine the look on the face of the pickpocket), fee for bank deposit

2. Travelers' Cheques
Why? Safe, simple system that we understand, changing them is never as easy as they would have you believe and it results in good stories
Why not? Costly (2% of purchase), fee for bank deposit

3. ATM
Why? Safe, simple system that we understand
Why not? Fee ranging from $3-7 per transaction, fee for bank deposit, you don't know what the exchange rate is until after the transaction (though they say they are typically good rates)

4. Wire Transfer
Why? Safe, money then available in bank
Why not? Large fee for transfer (up to $100), complicated

Although an ATM would be cheaper, we chose to go with the wire transfer because of the security. Part of what we have had to adjust to is the idea that we will have to pay to get our money.

Interesting thing about wire transfer - it has to be initiated in person by one of the account owners. We overcame that by adding someone to our account. Jerry seems like a nice enough fellow, was right there behind us in line at the bank, and was willing to be added to our account.

Well, which bank in CR? That was easy. Our friends have a friend that manages a branch for Ceska Sporitelna here in town. This is one of the most ubiquitous banks in the country. Most importantly, a connection to someone who can get things done is worth a lot no matter which continent you are standing on.

So, we went to the bank and opened an account. Had our friend Jan (who served a mission in London and is fluent in english) not accompanied us, this would have been difficult. As it turned out, we worked directly with the manager and it was smooth. Our only difficulty was when he asked how much we wanted to deposit to open the account. We pulled out a stack containing over $1,000. This branch, however, was not outfitted to change money. Between Jan (director of the mental health unit at a hospital) and us we scraped together 200 Czech Crowns (about $11.75) and opened the account.

We now have no fee ATM withdrawals, no fee check card, internet banking, the ability to pay the rent, and the peace of mind that comes from knowing our money is safe with this guy named Jerry, a large number of operatives between the US and here, and the staff at the local branch.